Page 118 of Love It or List It
“What?”Austin asked when Will didn’t offer anything further.
He shook his head.“Nothing.”But Austin thought he heard him muttering under his breath as he returned upstairs.“Un-be-fuckin’-lievable.”
Austin had to work the day of the dinner, but the kids were all coming over right after school, so he cleaned up and changed at work and sent Joe a text—call if you need anything on my way home—and then got in his car.
The phone remained silent, so it was only a short time before Austin pulled into the driveway.He parked in front of the pole barn, next to Meg’s little Chevy, and did his best to skirt the half-frozen puddles and slush piles on his way to the door.Not that the kids had bothered, judging by the melting goo pooling on the boot mat.
Austin added his own to the pile and poked his head into the kitchen, which already smelled like Joe’s enchilada casserole.“Hey.”
Four heads looked up from the table, two from the floor—the kids, Pepa, and Ozzy, but no Joe.Meg and Gavin waved; Alex nodded.Will huffed.
Tough crowd.“Where’s Joe?”
“Went to change his shirt,” Will said shortly.
God, did Will have something up his ass again?Austin hoped not.This was supposed to be a night for celebrating.He glanced at the stove timer.“Cool.Hey, help me set the table?”
It was another three minutes before Joe came in, face pink like he’d just scrubbed it with cold water.Austin hooked an arm around his waist before he could get to the kitchen and pulled him in for a kiss.“Hey.Enchilada sauce accident?”
Joe blinked at him as though he didn’t know what Austin was talking about.Then he looked down at his shirt.“Oh.Uh… yeah.”
Austin frowned.“Are you feeling okay?You’re not getting a fever again, are you?”
Joe batted his hand away from his forehead.“I’m fine,” he promised.“Can we eat?”
That wasn’t like him, to be so short, but maybe he was stressed.Maybe he’d gotten enchilada sauce on one of Gavin’s hilarious tree pun shirts.“Guess we better before the kids decide Pepa looks edible.”
Joe snorted.“I think they’d eat Will first.”
“Harsh.”
Dinner was—well, the food was good.Austin had questioned the wisdom of inviting Alex to a dinner to celebrate Meg when the two of them still had bouts of sniping, but Joe pointed out he couldn’t very well invite Gavin and not Alex without Alex feeling left out, or Gavin deciding not to come, and they figured they had to risk it.
And honestly Austin thought it was going okay until Meg asked Alex if they ever finished that rainbow sweater they were knitting.
It seemed like an innocuous question to Austin.Certainly no one else at the table seemed to think it landed like a grenade.Even Alex barely reacted, only shrugged disinterestedly.“I’m not really into knitting anymore.”
Maybe Meg’s question flew under the radar, but Alex’s answering tone did not.Gavin and Joe both raised their heads.Austin caught himself ping-ponging between expressions, trying to gauge what was about to go down.Should he clear the table of projectiles?
“Oh.”Meg deflated a little.She’d eaten a little over half her plate, which Austin knew by now was not enough to sustain an athlete of her caliber.The girl’s appetite was impressive.“You never said anything.I thought maybe we could do, like, our knitting thing next year.Like we used to, but on Skype or Facetime or whatever.”
That was a fucking friendship overture.Austin might not have a lot of friends, but even he could see that.And Alex was stabbing their plate like it had personally insulted them.
Still, Meg went on bravely.Austin felt like he was watching a car wreck in slow motion.“We could do something else instead,” she offered.“Like, remember when we all had to quarantine and we went online and binge-watchediCarly—”
Alex’s palm landed flat on the table.Will jumped.“That show’s for little girls.”
Meg’s slam echoed theirs like she’d just been waiting for those words.“Yeah,” she said coolly.“Except for how anybody can like anything, because gender’s a social construct.”
Alex’s mouth dropped open and they flushed deep enough to highlight the trio of freckles by their nose.
“Like, whatever,” Meg went on before Alex could defend themself.“I get why you didn’t want to tell me you thought you might be pregnant, because that shit’s scary even without the gender dysphoria.So whatever.It hurt, ’cause I thought we were friends, I’ve beentryingto be friends, I’ve been trying to understand what you’re going through.But it’s like you realized you weren’t a girl and somehow that meant you couldn’t do anything girly.Like havegirl friendsor talk about boys or fuckingknit.Which is so stupid!Will talks about boys!Lots of people knit!But you ditched all the hobbies you thought were toofemmeand you ditchedme, and I dare you to tell me it’s made you any fucking happier.”
“People change,” Alex snapped back.“I’m allowed to not like stuff anymore.”
“That’s not what I said!”
“You don’t get to decide for me!”
